Tomb Raider: Curse of the Sun Queen
by DoubleOAidan
Summary: My interpretation of the 2013 game. Same basic plot elements, etc, but a lot of stuff is changed around. This isn't Camilla Ludington's Lara Croft, either. Rated M just in case it offends. Plenty of swearing but no F-words or anything, violence with some blood but not really gory, some scary stuff and not really much romantic/sexual if there is anything. PG-13 movie-wise.


Chapter 1

Croft Manor was everything a house should be- sizeable but not imposing, with plenty of windows, and surrounded by pleasant green spaces. It was made of solid grey stone and worn red brick, its thick but homely walls equally suited as a fortress against the elements as they were a kindly chaperone of parties and play.

The house rocked slightly to one side, or at least the photograph it was in did in sync with the metal bulkhead it had been attached to with a small round magnet. The bulkhead was only one of many aboard the HMS _Hilary_ , an old minelayer named for British mountaineer Sir Edmund Hilary and retrofitted as an explorational vessel that now tossed gently in the calm waves in the Pacific Ocean, somewhere off the coast of Japan.

Footsteps approached, accompanied by a catchy pop tune leaking somewhat from a pair of headphones, and a pair of young, strong, graceful hands carefully removed the photograph from its magnetized perch, held it for a second, and then replaced it exactly as it had been.

The owner of the hands stepped away from the bulkhead and through the threshold leading to one of the ship's outer hallways, passing the room up, her back turned to it as her laced-up black combat boots clanked quietly against the floor and faded into the distance.

As she walked, she reached into the right pocket of her light brown khakis, her wrist rubbing against the black leather of the silver-buckled belt she wore and the green rubber covering the wires of a pair of headphones, and drew out a scuffed silver Mini R2 player tethered by its connected headphone jack, its screen lit a pale blue with the view of the playlist selected. Thumbing the edge of the square button wheel slightly to raise the volume, she slipped the Mini R2 back into her pocket.

She reached up to grasp the wired green camouflage-patterned headphones that hung over her long dark hair, drawn back in a braid that reached halfway down her back and knocked softly against her fitted navy blue tank top, and lifted them from their resting place on the bare skin around her neck, slipping them on over her head to let the music flow through her head and habitually sliding her hands into her pockets.

A pair of largish grey rats, snuffling at the floor for bits of food, skittered into the shadows as the young woman's heavy boots drew closer and then passed their original position without trace of variance in speed or pace.

She was of average height and slim, and noticeably fit without being particularly muscular, with a gently curving figure. Though it was difficult to tell her exact age, she looked to be between eighteen and twenty-two years old.

She was attractive too, and with the physical confidence to match. Her face was heart-shaped and unintentionally framed by the loose strands of hair that had escaped her braid, with smooth healthy skin and high, sharp cheekbones, and a small, straight nose that nicely complimented her naturally full lips. There was an old saying that you could see someone's soul in their eyes, and there was definitely something of this in hers. She had almond-shaped brown eyes that were almost Asian in appearance, and they were filled with intelligence and intensity of all types. On the surface, there was confidence, imagination, and curiosity; a little deeper, logic and ruthlessness, maybe even anger. Below that, it was hard to see, but it might be sadness.

The woman's name was Lara Croft. It was a plain name, one of those bland British names that you'd find in the "C" section of a phone book and wonder what the person who went by it looked like, what it was they did for a living, who they were. "Lara Croft" could be anyone… which was odd considering that the idea of just being "anyone" annoyed Lara. She didn't want to be "anyone". For starters, it wasn't very much fun.

She was actually the latest in a long and overall fairly distinguished line of Crofts who had ruled over a fairly large parcel of land in Britain from Roman times onwards which had by virtue of democratically minded governmental policies in the past few centuries shrunk from a sizeable countdom to the twenty acres of grounds containing the house, which while still enormous even in parts was no longer capable of functioning as a semi-autonomous nation-state. As the only surviving heir, Lara was now Lady Croft, Tenth Countess of Abbingdon, though this was an entirely ceremonial and superficial title, the main function of which was to adorn golden-edged dinner invitations.

Lara had been born into high society with both the prestige and money to support it as well as, in her words, "the crap that comes with being noble". Her parents, Lord Richard Croft and Lady Amelia Croft, had married young and with high hopes despite their marriage being somewhat forced by their respective parents, and Lady Croft had given birth to a baby girl, who, for whatever conceivable reason, had been named Lara. Lord Croft was rising to fame in the archaeological community, and he tended to be gone often on expeditions to remote sites around the world alongside his peers from Cambridge University, leaving Lady Croft and often just Winston, the family's butler, to attend to the girl.

As Lara grew, it was evident that she took after her father, perhaps even more than her father took after her father. Her pink playsuits and pretty dresses were soon ruined by a fascination with dirt, grass, running, jumping, climbing anything in sight, amateur acrobatics, and a general love of exploration. When finally allowed to choose her outfits by age six, she immediately grabbed on to plain T-shirts and tank tops, jeans and khakis, and running shoes or boots. It threw her prim, proper, ladylike mother into a tizzy and the gap between them only grew as Lara grew up. Being a future countess meant a dignified and quiet demeanor, stylish clothes, and plenty of fancy dress parties. It meant sitting around and being pretty. It meant wasting time and money on fancy clothes and makeup. It meant being "proper" and "respecting your elders", which really just meant doing whatever it was they said regardless of personal opinion. It was stuffy and boring and unimaginative, and Lara hated it.

When Lord Croft did visit, at least every few months, the household calmed down. But it didn't last, and the second he disappeared on another adventure, chaos reigned supreme. Lady Croft tried with every method possible to reign in her rebellious daughter, who showed not only a disdain for the life she was expected to follow defined enormous amounts of blatant disrespect for other aristocrats and a series of failed relationships with assorted male and female peers, but an aggressive streak that led to not only arguments with her mother but scratches and bruises from fights with other children and teens and even police reports for more intense fights as well as graffiti and shoplifting. Lady Croft had neither imagination for a life different than her own nor any real understanding of her daughter, while Lara lacked any care whatsoever for her mother or her own position in life which degraded on worse days into utter selfishness. Though a kind and loyal servant to all three Crofts, butler Winston was often confronted with conflicting orders from each of them, which lead to plenty of awkward compromises. The late nights were patterned by veritable symphonies of verbal frustration from all three of Croft Manor's long-term residents. The family, or what was left of it, went from a local scandal to a recurring tabloid feature, as intrepid paparazzi holed up in nearby towns and even snuck through gates and over walls to set up tents inside the woods and grasslands of the Croft estate.

During Lara's last year of primary school, Lord Croft was reported missing and presumed dead in Kampuchea. It was the last straw for everyone involved. That night, Lady Croft broke down in tears during a dinner party. The same evening, camera footage and witnesses chronicled an enraged Lara's destructive rampage through a nearby grocers, where she was found minutes later by police amidst broken shelving and ruined vegetables, sitting on the floor, head in hands and crying uncontrollably.

The scandal that followed was a blessing for the now fully entrenched tabloids, and the news had spread all across the world in less than a week. Lara and her mother nearly came to blows, resulting in Lara being driven out of Croft Manor. The period that followed, despite excellent academic performance, was defined by Lara's frequent transfer from one university to another in the wake of another series of oft-reported scandals, and "Lara Croft" was one of InfoZoom's top fifty search terms for some time. A crackdown by Lady Croft on Lara's use of family money led Lara to attempt a university scholarship coupled with a career in the British Army, which failed quickly and miserably in charges of assault and insubordination. Though her track record was definitively terrible, a board of professors at Cambridge University saw promise in Lara, who was a bright and interested student overall, especially in studies of history, archaeology, and self-defense, and pushed for her acceptance into the university on a limited scholarship that relied mainly on her personal savings and copious amounts of credit. As before, despite the high quality of work collected, including several projects on ancient civilizations, tensions simmered and erupted between Lara and other students and staff, and threatened to drive her out once again, this time without such substantial finances to rely on.

It was most likely a stroke of pure luck that the Okamoto family, one of Cambridge's largest beneficiaries, noticed Lara's work on the semi-mythical Japanese island kingdom of Yamatai and became quite interested, partially due to their insistence of their heritage as tracing all the way back to the rulers of Yamatai. They'd met with faculty, staff, and Lara herself to discuss the research, which among other things attempted to pinpoint a location for Yamatai within the Dragon's Triangle sea region near Japan, as well as the possibility of funding an expedition to discover the lost kingdom.

Though impressed by the claims and evidence presented as well as the Okamotos' promise to fully fund the expedition, the university was loath to give Lara any control over the proceedings, with the compromise reached having the expedition led by an esteemed Cambridge professor, and plenty of other concessions were made to even allow Lara on board the expedition vessel, especially as a junior advisor/consultant for the expedition. These concessions included having the eldest Okamoto child, a student at the university, on board alongside a humorless American security guard whose real purpose was to prevent Lara from gaining any real influence. It had certainly been a strain for all three of them, but as the HMS _Hilary_ departed from the London docks, Lara had allowed herself a smile in hopes of what wonders the trip might bring.

And now, here they were, by calculations within a week or less of the beauty and wonder of Yamatai, and the crew of the _Hilary_ would be the first in more than a thousand years to set eyes upon it.

The normally dark corridor was lit by a triangle of light from a half-open door which swung gently with the motion of the ship, and voices emanated from it along with the scent of something cooking. Lara headed towards it, passing the the thick metal bracings against the bulkheads, and quietly let herself in.

The room wasn't enormous, but it wasn't small either. It lacked windows, but that was no concern for those inside. Technically it was the ship's kitchen, but it had become a gathering place for the rest of the passengers and crew to talk while catching a whiff of what was on the menu coming up. Most of them were gathered around, many sitting or standing around a battered metal table spread with two laptops and a variety of maps and charts. There was Professor Martin Harrison, the head of the expedition, in his customary khakis and dress shirt with bow tie, Eileen Sales, the ship's navigator, in her jeans and pea coat, Sam Evans, the security guard, in his grey tactical outfit and back armor vest, Samantha Okamoto in a denim skirt and green designer T-shirt, and graduate students Yasmin Awad in jeans, a white T-shirt, and a bright orange hijab, and Jason Garzas in athletic shorts and a T-shirt emblazoned with some sort of superhero logo. MacDonald, the cook whose first name no one knew, was stirring an enormous pot of stew on the nearby stove, his bushy grey brows furrowed over the meal. Harrison and Sales were arguing. Lara pulled out her R2 player to pause the song, before slipping it back into her pocket and letting her headphones resume their position around her neck, slotting her thumbs into her hands into her pockets as well and leaning back against the nearest bulkhead to listen to the conversation in comfort.

"- which means that the calculations are all wrong," Harrison was saying. "We're more than three hundred kilometers off the predicted position right now. Yamatai is supposed to be closer to Korea than Japan."

"And given the shift in accuracy of navigational charts over the past two thousand years, that's also totally wrong," responded Sales, her blue eyes narrowing in frustration. "We're not looking for an outlying island. This was a large and significant site, not some minor fiefdom. As an archaeologist, I'd expect you to understand this."

"Will ye stop arguin'," grumbled MacDonald in a gruff Scottish accent. "It's no good for the stew."

"I'm going with Mrs. Sales here," said Samantha thoughtfully. "We're close- I know it. I can feel it somehow."

"Why don't we just go with her gut, then," said Harrison sarcastically. " _That_ sounds logical."

"You didn't have to be rude about it," sighed Samantha.

"I think you're just making up things to make up for the fact that your original calculations were wrong," retorted Sales. "We're close, and you're just pissing around because we're not going _your_ way."

"I am the HEAD of this expedition, and I will do as I see fit!" snapped Harrison. "I spent two weeks on this! Two sleepless weeks of figuring and calculating and looking through every single source from the time period with even the faintest connection to Yamatai! Without me, you're handing this whole endeavor over to that irresponsible Croft girl!"

"Oh, _really?_ " said Lara in a very pointed fashion, crossing her arms in an obvious show of frustration.

"Why, Miss Croft," said Harrison, backpedaling furiously, "we were just mentioning you."

"In the nicest of terms, too," said Lara sarcastically. "But I see _I'm_ the irresponsible one here."

"The stew's bound to turn now," muttered MacDonald, stirring some more.

"Look, Lara, I trust your research," said Sam. "I mean, you're the reason we're here to start with."

" _Thank you_ , Sam," said Lara.

"That doesn't mean anything," scoffed Harrison. "You failed to take into account any of the reports from the time of the world wars and later."

"Almost all of which were unsubstantiated nonsense from half-dead Imperial Japanese sailors," said Sales. "She used computerized maps and descriptions from Chinese and Japanese diplomats of the time period, both of which place Yamatai as part of a short island chain somewhere within the Dragon's Triangle. You've got this, Lara."

"A real scholar would have used _all_ the evidence available, instead of selectively choosing a portion to use for a simpler conclusion," scoffed Harrison. "The real world is _never_ so simple."

"I used _academic_ sources only," replied Lara, stepping forwards. "I thought that's what you people were all about."

"Will ye _shut up_ before ye drive me crazy!" snapped MacDonald. "I'm tryin' to _cook_ somethin' over 'ere."

"I'm with Lara," said Evans in his gruff voice. It was not a voice you were compelled to argue with. "She did the original work. She got us this far. Let's at least see if she's right or not before you discount her again."

" _Head_ of the expedition!" roared Harrison, banging a fist down on the table. "More like _back-seat driver_ of the expedition." He stormed off, muttering to himself under his breath, something about how _he_ was the one with a PhD and _he_ was the one with experience and the whole expedition had been _his_ idea to start with.

"I've had enough," grumbled MacDonald, almost in synchronization. "You lot can find your own damn supper." He placed a lid on the pot of stew, grabbed onto it with a pair of potholders, and stumped off as well.

"What an ass," said Lara bluntly.

"I don't blame MacDonald all that much," said Evans. "But it's Harrison I can't stand. Guys like him are a real problem, always trying to prove they're smarter than everyone else. There's a difference between education and brains."

"Don't get me wrong, I think he's got both," said Sales. "It's his need to rise above everyone else that's really trying."

"Thanks for helping me out though," said Lara.

"Ah, no problem," said Sales. "Like I said, your research is the reason we're here, and I think he ought to respect that."

The ship, which had been rocking in a series of slowly increasing swings, gave a large and violent jolt, sending Sales, Evans, and Samantha stumbling into the table, knocking off several maps and one of the laptops as Lara, Jason, and Yasmin were sent careening towards the nearest bulkhead. There were several groans as the ship rocked uncomfortably back towards equilibrium.

"Damnit!" snapped Evans.

"That was my laptop," said Sales, going over to pick it up and inspect it for damage "It's getting worse out there."

"I'm going up to the bridge to see what's going on," said Lara. "Is anyone coming along?"

"I'll go with you, Lara," said Samantha.

"I'm going back to my room," grumbled Evans. "You can tell me about it when it's all over."

"Same," said Yasmin, and they headed out the nearest door.

"I'm gonna be sick," said Jason, and he followed them.

"I might as well come along with you two," said Sales, nodding at her still-working laptop in satisfaction and closing it to put it into sleep mode. She tucked it under one arm and looked to them. "After all, I am the navigator. I might be able to find us an easier way through this crap."

They headed out of the kitchen and along the passageway until they came to a set of stairs and began going up. As they entered the next corridor, at the highest level of the ship, the ship gave another jolt, and lightning flashed in the darkness outside the windows, lighting up the interior for a fraction of a second. Sales and Samantha nearly fell back down the stairs, grabbing the railings tightly, and Lara stumbled into a bulkhead, slamming into it with her shoulder. She grunted in pain and gripped it for a second, leaning against the bulkhead to steady herself and regain her balance before they started moving again.

"This is really serious," said Samantha. "This is the fifth time this has happened today."

"This is the Dragon's Triangle, Miss Okamoto," said Sales. "One of its biggest dangers is its unpredictability.. Calm waters to stormy seas in the blink of an eye."

"I'm sure you've heard the legends by now, Sales,"said Lara. "Yamatai was ruled by Himiko, the Sun Queen. It was said that the sun rose and set by her command, and that her anger was the cause of the island's storms."

"Yes, but that's all they are, Lara, just legends," said Sales, as they headed down the corridor to the bridge.

The bridge of the HMS _Hilary_ was a sizeable room with a wide band of windows running along three of its four walls. There were more light fixtures, old ones in sturdy metal cages, overhead than on the rest of the ship. The floor had been covered in textured rubber mats which came right up to the edges of the few chairs and the old analogue control consoles which sat in straight, parallel banks along the floor with wide spaces in between for the crew to move about. Most of the consoles were fitted with nondescript grey metal boxes with lines of electronics ports, a few buttons and switches, and multitudes of small lights, some labeled, some not, which automated most of the ship's systems. The ship's helm was on its own console island in the very front of the bridge.

Jackson "Eel" Kamehameha was the only crew member on decak, and one of the only crew members period. He was from the Hawaiian islands, a skilled captain who'd grown up with the sea. It was more than evident in his muscular physique, long black hair, and the variations of tank tops and board shorts he wore seemingly everywhere. He kept his hands on the wheel and his eyes on the windows, turning the ship as best he could to account for the motion of the waves. Sporadic flashes of lightning painted his brown skin pale for half an instant.

"How's it looking, Eel?" asked Sales.

Eel chuckled noisily. "How do you think? Not good. The waves are going crazy out there, and the visibility's shot. I think we're headed straight into a big one."

"Oh no," mumbled Sam. "Like a tropical storm?"

"Something like that," said Eel. "Don't get me wrong, the _Hilary_ can ride it out. She's built for worse. But that doesn't mean we're not in for a beating."

"What about the radar?" asked Lara.

Sales set her laptop down and went over to check on the grainy green radar monitor. "Not good at all. We're headed straight into a storm, just like he said."

"Can't we maneuver around it?" asked Lara.

"No way," said Sales. "I mean, all I can see on here is storm."

There was another flash of lightning, and the ship heaved, throwing everyone but Eel to the floor. Lara stumbled to her feet just in time to see a wave wash over the deck of the _Hilary_.

"This is some serious shit," said Eel. He looked genuinely worried. It was the first time the entire trip Lara had seen him like that, and it didn't make her feel any better about the situation.

"Is it too late to try to turn around now?" asked Samantha, glancing back and forth.

"We're in the thick of it now," said Sales, glancing from the radar to the windows and back again. "We might as well ride it out. It ought to be gone by tomorrow morning."

"Please let it be before then," said Samantha. "I don't think I can sleep in this at all."

"Who said anything about sleeping?" said Eel, and chuckled again, just as another wave washed over the deck, even larger than the last one. The ship heaved once again, and there was an unpleasant sound of metal straining.

"I don't like that sound," said Lara bluntly, as the group grabbed hold of the nearest anchored objects to stay themselves from falling.

"That sound's just the ship doing her job," said Eel as yet another wave washed over the deck with another enormous jolt. But he didn't sound so sure of himself, and he was nearly drowned out by another loud and ominous series of creaks.

"Everyone just sit down where you are," said Sales, and they did just in time as another wave rocked up and over the ship, the water now splashing heavily up against the windows. There was a another series of creaks, and something like a cracking noise.

"Oh no," said Eel, and he ducked down behind the captain's console.

Lara heard the next wave, and felt it, but she didn't see it before it was far too late, as seawater smashed through the windows and poured into the bridge.

"Christ on a bike!" snapped Sales, as the water rushed past them. Lara craned her head up from behind the console just in time to duck down as the next wave rushed in.

This one washed them straight out of the bridge and down onto the sloshing, flooded, moving deck of the _Hilary_. Lara felt that she could hear something beneath the rush of water, a horrible, straining, cracking sound unlike anything she'd heard before.

When she had made her way to her feet, in front of her, the worst had come true. She was facing the bridge, and in the deck between her and the others there was a fissure, an enormous crack she could see straight through, down into a cross-section of the ship's hull, which was still lit, and very quickly filling with water. The _Hilary_ was no longer one ship but two broken halves which were sinking at at incredibly fast rate.

Had to find… something to float. Something to hang onto. Eel, Sales, and Samantha were climbing into an inflatable rubber lifeboat, and she could only hope that the others had found something as well. She needed something to float with, too

The lifeboats on her side of the ship seemed to have been swept away, but to her left, not too far away, was a orange ring-shaped life preserver. She made a dash for it, and another wave threw her to her knees and swept the life preserver to one side.

She dived for the life preserver, and caught the white rope attached to it with one hand as another wave washed the deck, which was now sinking steadily deeper in the water. The wave washed her off the deck, and out into the open ocean.

A sinking ship created cavitation, introducing air to the water around it in such a way that it could make floating extremely difficult. Lara knew plenty of applicable science, and she needed to be out of the way of the _Hilary_ before it sunk altogether.

She hooked her arms around the life preserver, and kicked as hard and fast she could, struggling to keep her head above water as it roared around her, splashing her up and down, through crests and troughs endlessly. She could feel the mass of her wet clothes, boots, and hair pulling her down, but she refused to give in. She wasn't going to die out here. Not like this, and not anytime soon.

She struggled and kicked forward in one direction as much as she could, trying her hardest to stay afloat in a neverending battle with the raw power of the sea itself as time and distance drifted away into nothingness.

At some point, the waves seemed to have calmed somewhat. They were still choppy, but nowhere near as massive and brutal as before, and they were easier to float on. Lara finally worked up the strength and timing to climb up on top of the raft and lay there, half-sitting, laying back in fatigued laziness as if enjoying a water ride at some ridiculously intense amusement park. There was something prickling at the back of her mind, but she had looked around, up and down, and noticed no immediate threat. Though more than a bit hungry, there was nothing to consume anywhere nearby, and she was too wet and tired to be bothered by half-finished thoughts. The sound of the waves lulled her to relaxation as she closed her eyes and drifted off into a deep and dreamless sleep.


End file.
